7 Healthy And Delicious Substitutes For Salad Dressing

Salad dressing is meant to ENHANCE the flavor of a salad and to mix all the ingredients together. However, we tend to use way too much salad dressing to a a point where you can’t even taste the food itself. Traditional salad dressing also typically consists of several chemicals and sugar combined together giving you a high sugar and high calorie diet disaster! When we eat food, we want to actually taste the food and not smother it in some sauce or dressing. And if we are going to smother our food in something, it should at least be healthy and taste great!

Below are my 7 favorite healthy ingredients to use instead of salad dressing:

1. Guacamole

Avocado or using guacamole is my all time favorite “salad dressing” because it tastes amazing and is amazing for you! Avocado is full of healthy fat, vitamins and nutrients and the combination of fat and fiber will help to keep you full as well. Mash up avocado or use guacamole and mix in with your salad.

2. Hummus

Hummus is another great substitute for salad dressing because it has great flavor and is very good at keeping a salad together. Mix in a few tablespoons into your next salad. Look for a brand that has very few ingredients listed on the label and ideally the hummus should consist of just chickpeas, olive oil, and spices.

3. Hard boiled egg (chopped)

I love hard boiling eggs and then throwing one( or a few) in a salad and chopping it up and mixing. The yolk is key with helping keeping the salad together so don’t skip the yolks! It also gives you a great protein and fat addition to your salad as well as great flavor! Take it a step further and make a guacamole egg salad by mixing a couple tablespoons of guacamole with a couple eggs then mixing into your salad.

4. Liquid Aminos

I love using liquid aminos as a substitute for soy sauce because it tastes just like soy sauce and is gluten-free and uses gmo-free soybeans. It is also calorie free and sugar free and adds great flavor to salads as well as marinades for protein.

5. Coconut oil

I love coconut oil on everything, and if you love the slight coconut flavor of coconut oil then add it to your salad! Coconut oil contains short chain fatty acids meaning it is easily broken up and digested by your body to be used instantly for energy rather than fat. Coconut oil also may increase your metabolism when consuming it.

6. Balsamic vinegar

‘Vinegar” is the key word here, any type of vinegar is great but balsamic is by far the most common in restaurants. Important note: Avoid vinaigrette which has added sugar making it a high calorie dressing – vinaigrette does not equal vinegar.

7. Olive oil

A couple dashes of olive oil give you a good dose of healthy fats with zero sugar to help keep you satisfied and give you amazing health benefits! You don’t need much olive oil to give your salad great flavor, so don’t go overboard 😉

Enjoy!

About the author: Sarah-Kate Rems is an Ivy-league trained Board-Certified Family Nurse Practitioner licensed in California with an expertise in preventative healthcare. She considers nutrition and exercise to be the basis of well-being and is a strong advocate for daily physical activity and maintaining a healthy diet. Sarah-Kate is also a co-founder of The Mindful Tech Lab